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Comment by vxxxxxxxxxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

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While I don't disagree with the substance of this essay -- I think this point needs to be made, and this discussion needs to be had -- it's very difficult to offer "open forums for contentious debate" when certain speakers have built showmanship out of their propensity to offend. This fits most definitions of deliberate trolling, and isn't a productive recipe for reasoned debate, protests and boycotts by the populace drive home the point that the speaker's views are already well-known, and not welcome at all.

Similarly, some brave institutions may decide to host speakers that are near-universally condemned for views that society has decided to be abhorrent. By giving such speakers a forum, they're endorsing that such views are worthy of being heard or debated, whether they are enthused by those ramifications or not. Such behavior requires calculated risk, risk that may pay off if attitudes change in the future.

Yeah, he has a point in the abstract, but this would have been better timed before Steve Bannon took over the executive branch and basically broke the Overton window.

It's intellectually lazy to dismiss views via ad-hominem attacks, but it's also intellectually lazy to consider all views morally equivalent. White supremacy has entered the political discourse and it does not deserve equal time.

The problem as I see it, is that suppressing certain points of view because of they are abhorrent, using ad hominems, or social or economic pressures - looks identical to suppressing more legitimate points of view for malicious reasons.

The only way to really reliably tell the difference is to look at the actual substance of the points of view - which is the thing very thing attacks push to the side.

It is worse than lazy to consider all views morally equivalent.

It is aiding and abetting evil. It actively undermines reasoned discourse.

This is the point Jon Stewart was trying to make way back in 2004 when he took down Crossfire. The situation clearly has not improved. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossfire_(TV_series)#Jon_Stew...

Except for your last point about Jon Stewart, your point could easily have been made by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom%C3%A1s_de_Torquemada

Once you have a moral compass that is not even open to debate, it is a short step to suppressing all debate and even persecution of the "filthy scum" that dare question your morals.

> white supremacy has entered the political discourse

I must have missed that. Can you link to a few (mainstream) examples? The only thing I'm aware of are smears against Bannon...

> White supremacy has entered the political discourse and it does not deserve equal time.

I'm curious to hear your thoughts on feminism and black nationalism. Do you consider these viewpoints to be "morally equivalent" to white supremacy?

That's quite a grab bag. Should we throw in radical veganism, Zionism, and libertarianism too? How are you going to measure the "moral equivalency" or non-equivalency of these positions?

So, to get started, these are all objects in some category, but I'm not sure what the defining features of this category are. They all have beliefs about groups of people, sort of (libertarianism going for "all individuals" often, veganism involving animals on par with people with respect to certain rights). Several involve thoughts on government (black nationalism, Zionism, libertarianism) and others don't (white supremacy, feminism, veganism) so that can't quite be it. Some explicitly put down other groups ("supremacy" is a giveaway) and others don't (feminism doesn't, black nationalism often doesn't, depends on the flavor of veganism and Zionism).

Even if you leave out my additions, what makes feminism, black nationalism, and white supremacy comparable? Why did you put them together? One's racist, one's separatist, and one is about equality; they don't have the same relationships to governance; going back to category theory how are you going to construct morphisms between these to compare them?

You can categorize them as identity politics.

Which is what I was trying to get at - I don't think that identity politics are useful anymore in the modern age we live in.

What's inconsistent to me is if one accepts the moral superiority of one type of identity politics over another. Either you accept them all or you categorically deny them all.

> Either you accept them all or you categorically deny them all.

"Identity politics" is not about what people say, it's about how they organize. It neither validates nor invalidates one's arguments. I reject your assertion.

That's an opinion. I've seen quite a few feminists committed to blanket assumptions of what's wrong with men, or that feminism requires women be chosen over men, as opposed to having equal opportunity. It is entirely possible to see certain feminists in much the same vein as I'd evaluate a white supremacist.

Bear in mind, there's a "feminist" out there who's advocated for reducing the male population of the earth by 90%. Obviously a radical example, but my point is, you can treat these widespread viewpoints as cut and dry as you've placed them.

What kind of question is that? Only the most ridiculous strawman of feminism could compare to __ supremacy. (I won't address "black nationalism" because the term is too unspecific.)

Feminism: it's great.

Black nationalism (American variety): feeeeeh.

> By giving such speakers a forum, they're endorsing that such views are worthy of being heard or debated

No, they're not. In almost all cases speakers at a University are invited by a group of individuals, be it a student group or some other association. They are the ones who are saying the speaker has ideas worthy of discussion. If a University has any respect for diversity of opinion, it will refrain from suppressing any significant subgroup within its walls.

But university students should be exposed to 'deliberate trolling'. They are supposed to be developing critical thinking skills so they should be able to realize on their own that they are being trolled and leave the speech/room/whatever.

The current environment in universities is such that students are protected from ever dealing with uncomfortable topics, which leaves them inadequately prepared to intellectually engage them in the real world.

I work at a university and don't find that my students are protected from dealing with uncomfortable topics. I do find that they're more willing to talk about uncomfortable topics than in the past -- people say they don't like x or y and do like z or w rather than simply remaining politely silent as they have in other times.

There seems to be an idea that you have to listen silently with socially-appropriate nodding to speakers about uncomfortable topics in order to have "dealt with them", and instead a lot of students argue back these days. Which is better, lie back & listen or have a discussion? While it's occasionally uncomfortable to have students argue with me, it's much less a waste of my time than talking to a room of cell-phone-illuminated slack expressions.

>a lot of students argue back these days. Which is better, lie back & listen or have a discussion?

Arguing back is great! What's not is petitioning to have you banned from the campus or punished in a title 9 inquisition[1] because the topics you taught made them uncomfortable.

1. http://laurakipnis.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/My-Title-I...

If you read the petition, it doesn't say anything about being banned from campus [1].

The title IX investigation was ridiculously mishandled, agreed, and the two grad student complainants also allege it was mishandled [2]. The whole thing involves at least 4 title IX investigations and four+ lawsuits if you're going to count the original sexual harassment lawsuits Kipnis wrote about in her Chronicle article (which is where she made the initial factual errors that led to some of the subsequent title IX complaints). I have to say, none of this was about anything she taught: it was about her commentary in a national publication on specific ongoing harassment lawsuits and countersuits.

[1] https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScr34pXKmDVPSXbi4TQ...

[2] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/31/laura-kipnis-essay-...

> I have to say, none of this was about anything she taught: it was about her commentary in a national publication on

That's what makes it so much worse. Just expressing an opinion off campus in public was enough to bring this on.

And deliberate trolls should be exposed to protests. Protests are a form of speech too.

"By giving such speakers a forum, they're endorsing that such views are worthy of being heard or debated"

Exactly. Free and open debate of controversial ideas, however heinous, say in a classroom setting is very different from actively providing hate-mongers a prominent forum from which to spread their hate. Former is academic freedom, the latter is a political decision.

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